Rubio pollster: GOP needs 40% Latino vote to win White House

The Republican Party has been wrestling with this topic for years now. Every time the question of immigration reform comes up, it is tied to the argument that unless the GOP signs on to some reform bill, they will lose more of the Latino vote. Some Republicans even make the argument and now one prominent pollster, who will likely be working on Marco Rubio’s possible presidential campaign, is making the case.

Republicans widely acknowledge that in order to take back the White House in 2016, they must make steady gains in winning back Latino voters, only 27 percent of whom supported Mitt Romney in 2012.

But Whit Ayres, a prominent Republican pollster who will work for Sen. Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign, says the party has to do much better much faster. Ayres told reporters Tuesday morning that the Republican nominee must capture more than 40 percent of the Latino vote in 2016 to win the presidency—and suggested that his candidate is uniquely positioned to do so.

“A Republican nominee is going to need to be somewhere in the mid-forties, or better, among Hispanic voters,” Ayres said at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast. The pollster noted that his candidate is “extraordinarily talented” and could be “transformational” in expanding the GOP’s appeal. [Emphasis added]

That would represent a quantum leap from 2012, when Romney won just 27 percent of Latinos—a major reason for his electoral drubbing at the hands of President Barack Obama. Romney’s abysmal numbers were even a drop-off from John McCain, who took 31 percent of Latinos against Obama in 2008.

It’s pretty convenient that Rubio’s pollster is the one making the argument given that Rubio himself has stated the he, as a presidential candidate, could make inroads and win over more Latino voters. Why not hire the guy to back you up with the “data” to prove it?

The question I have is whether this 40% number, or any particular number, is really accurate. Does not winning enough Latino voters automatically preclude the GOP from victory in 2016? Is it simply a question of demographics or picking the right candidate?

Nate Ashworth is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of Election Central. He's been blogging elections and politics for almost a decade. He started covering the 2008 Presidential Election which turned into a full-time political blog in 2012 and 2016.

9 COMMENTS

Is there a poll as to how Rubio and Cruz poll among Hispanics? It is taken for granted that Hispanics will mindlessly rush to them, the way Blacks voted almost unanimously for Obama. But women did NOT vote for Palin.

Besides, if my family were from Mexico, I’d be p*ssed off that these Cubans got the royal treatment when they sneaked across the border. Hardly kinship.

In Texas, don’t call a Mexican American a Latino, irregardless of the census label.
Latinos are from Cuba, Central and South America. And, any Hispanic or Latino will tell the Cubans in Florida are in a league all their own due to special US laws just for them.